One of the fastest growing areas in the computer industry today is the tablet computer. Despite its similar appearance to a smartphone, a tablet computer is typically characterized by a larger display screen and greater computing power. The display screen of a tablet computer is generally of a touch screen variety that enables a user to operate and interact with the tablet computer by directly touching the display screen rather than using a peripheral mouse and keyboard. Conventional tablet computers not only offer various features that are tailored for mobile computing but also provide network connectivity to the Internet via Wi-Fi or a cellular network.
A flat panel monitor generally provides a much larger display screen than that of a tablet computer and is typically designed for use with a desktop computer. A flat panel monitor is typically intended for providing a standalone display or a television set with dedicated electronics. Moreover, flat panel monitors are wall-mounted or held up with a stand placed on a surface. Due to its relatively large size and weight, a flat panel monitor is not typically designed with mobility in mind. In comparison to a flat panel monitor, a tablet computer is designed for mobile applications and equipped with more general purpose hardware including a central processing unit (CPU) and various input/output (I/O) ports such as a universal serial bus (USB), a high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI) and an external display port. A tablet computer runs an operating system (OS) such as OS X® or ANDROID®. While a tablet computer with a display size comparable to a flat panel monitor is desired for certain applications, such a tablet computer is not optimized for providing a mobile computing environment and multiple user applications and interactions.